to Alan Woodward

Richard P. Feynman to Alan Woodward, March 31, 1982

Alan Woodward
Southampton, Britain

Dear Mr. Woodward:

Surely increased knowledge is not incompatible with a humanitarian career—no matter what it is you learn. And surely if your professor and fellow students seem to know some things, but seem to be oblivious to other things (“outside their laboratory door,” as you say) that does not exclude you from learning what they know whilst remaining deeply aware of what they are blind to.

Of course, the course that physics is taking you has something missing. You cannot develop a personality with physics alone, the rest of your life must be worked in.